


Spa Day

by inknpaint



Category: Black Widow (Comics), Winter Soldier (Comics)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-28
Updated: 2013-07-28
Packaged: 2017-12-21 16:13:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,244
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/902271
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inknpaint/pseuds/inknpaint
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On the suggestion of Tony, Natasha and Bucky are taking a spa day--much to the chagrin of Bucky. But in true superhero fashion, the day isn't as relaxing as it should be...for Bucky at least.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Spa Day

**Author's Note:**

> "926. People tend to overestimate the value of weapons. Choosing the time and place of a fight is often more important than having a lot of firepower. It doesn’t matter if all you’ve got is some spa rocks and a wet towel. If you can surprise an unarmed opponent on favorable ground, that can be all you need." [[How to Be a Spy](http://being-a-spy.tumblr.com/)]
> 
> This came up on my dash, and I couldn't get the mental image of Bucky fighting off a horde of baddies in nothing more than a towel at a day spa. Thus this fic was born. (Sorry if there are any grammatical, spelling errors, I'm posting this with out proof reading it.)

"Remind me again why we're doing this?"

"Tony's right, both of us need to relax." 

"Okay, now I really don't think this is a good idea...you do realize you just agreed with something Tony said, right?"

Natalia raises an eyebrow at James, "That's besides the point. Now, stop complaining and just enjoy your time here. Tony's paying for the whole thing."

She pulls out Tony's credit card when they get to the front desk. James stands uncomfortably next to her, looking around the lobby with a look of disgust. The soundscape music and trickling fountains make him uneasy, and his instinct to leave the place is coming from more than just his unwillingness to be there.

"Nat, I don't like this place...there's something off about it," he leans over to whisper to her as she finishes making the transaction.

"Really, James...I understand that you don't want to be here, but not every place we step into is teaming with HYDRA agents; I assure you," she says, not bothering to lower her voice. "Now, just relax...I'll see you in a bit."

"Wait, what do you mean?"

"I'm going over here to the women's half of the spa, and you're going over there to the men's half of the spa," she says, turning to follow the lady behind the counter without another word.

Bucky's unease is only amplified when he steps into the men's half of the spa. It is completely empty besides the staff. There has to be other men dragged here by their girlfriends or wives, right? He tries to brush it off as nothing, take Natalia's advice and relax. But he is even more tense than when they had arrived.

He sits in the sauna—towel around his waist, spa slippers on his feet, a cool cloth around his neck and a disgruntled look on his face. But his brooding quickly turns to alertness as another man walks into the sauna. He too is only wearing a towel around his waist with his spa slippers, but something is off—beyond the man's lack of a chilled towel. 

It doesn't take long for James to recognize the guy in front of him as a HYDRA agent he had let slip through his fingers the other day. And as soon as the man sees the realization on Bucky's face, it only takes a split second for a fight to break out.

Bucky blocks the man's fist punch grabbing a hot rock from the basin to hit the man over the head with it. The door to the sauna flies open, letting a few more agents in as the first slumped to the floor. James grabs the man's towel ("Aaaw, come on! How come he gets to wear shorts!?"), twirling it quickly to use as a whip. The agent he aims at grabs the towel before it could get him—wrapping it around his hand in attempt to pull James off his balance. But Bucky is already several moves ahead of him, using the agent's move before the agent could do it—pulling the man off balance, wrapping the towel around the man's neck and pulling till there is a satisfying snap. He uses the body to make the other agents that had frozen in their tracks back off before jumping into action.

He takes out these two men simultaneously, countering a few of their moves before bashing their heads together—promoting more agents to come out of the wood works.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah...cut off one head two more grow back it's place..." he groans, hoping Nat was experiencing the same hospitality as him.

Natasha would never admit to James that she too had been apprehensive about going to the day spa—the thought of relaxing and some stranger touching her made her anything but relaxed. But that was before soaking in the hot Japanese bath, sitting in the steam room and sinking into a mineral bath. She honestly couldn’t remember the last time she’d let herself be this relaxed—even striking up a conversation with a few of the other women enjoying the spa. 

“Where the hell do all of you guys come from?!” Bucky yells as he’s forced to take on more men.

They’re unarmed, and not nearly as quick thinking as James is when it comes to improvising weapons. Between the pitchers of cucumber infused water, bowls of iced towels and several bodies of hot water, he makes quick work of taking the hordes of men out. What the HYDRA agents lack in skill, they make up for in numbers. And even in this setting, that still rings true. 

The fight ends when the floor of the spa is a mess of blood, broken glass, dead and knocked-out agents. Bucky can already feel a bruised rib or two, blood is dripping down from a cut on his forehead and his heavy breathing echoing through the now still room. He walks over to one of the showers jumping in quickly before changing back into his clothed—his expression even more bothered and cross as he burst the woman’s half of the spa (ready for a fight).

Several women scream, quickly covering themselves up, but Natalia’s “JAMES!” comes in clear above all of the commotion.

“What the hell are you doing?” she asks, quickly exiting the jacuzzi she was in to confront James.

Bucky has turned to look away from the obviously calm and not hostile environment of the woman’s half of the spa. 

“What the hell happened to you?” she asks again, noticing the cut on his forehead as well as his wince when she jabbed in him the ribs.

“I told you I had a bad feeling about this place!” he says to her in a loud whisper. “I was trying to relax. I really was! But then this guy walked in sauna—you remember that HYDRA agent that got away the other day? Well, it was him. And a fight broke out, next thing I knew the whole room was flooded with HYDRA agents, I was standing there with nothing but a towel around my waist, and I was fighting off a horde of blockheaded HYDRA goons.”

Natalia’s expression grows more and more skeptical as James finishes his story, arms crossed over her naked chest and a frown on her face.

“I know how much you don’t want to be here, James. But do you honestly expect me to believe you took on a mob of HYDRA agents in the middle of a spa without anyone noticing?” she scoffs, turning around to go back to soaking. “Jesus Christ, you don’t have to make up some idiotic story. If you want to leave, leave. _I_ , on the other hand, am going to stay here for what Tony paid for.”

Bucky looks at her, his jaw somewhere on the floor. She really doesn’t believe him, she’s probably not going to believe him, and he’s either stuck walking home or trying to relax in a room full of dead bodies. He sighs, exiting the women’s half of the spa and proceeding to the men’s half. 

He changes out of his clothes again, grabbing one of the few clean towels left (as well as a chilled towel off the floor). He then moves the body blocking the doorway to the sauna, pours some eucalyptus infused water over the hot stones to fill the room with steam and finally finds himself relaxing.


End file.
